However, I believe (as did the founding fathers) that it is generally healthy to critique closely any attempt to restrict personal freedom.
There's a difference between critique and outright refusal to consider. Almost all of the backlash I see is of the latter, with no pragmatic consideration for whether it will improve or diminish quality of life.
I strongly disagree. Perhaps you would care to illustrate some of the "meaningless" freedoms you refer to?
Something that people regularly get upset about is a surveillance society. But whether computers (or even humans, on occasion) are watching you walk down the street or not is entirely meaningless to your quality of life. It is only an insult to ideology, not to normal experience.
That's just one example of many. Again, almost all of the backlash I see are to do with privacy issues or liberty issues which are meaningless to their actual quality of life.
It's your prerogative not to believe him, but the way I see it, if this person wants to move out of his country, something must be pushing him to do it.
Yes. Ideology.
You seem all about trading that which is of little value for that which is of high value ... it seems to me that this guy is doing just that. He is looking to see if he can find an environment which will give him a reasonable degree of comfort and security without unduly infringing on his rights and freedoms.
He'll be giving up high value liberties for what will ultimately turn out to be low value ones. Although, of course, as is the case with those blinded by ideology, he'll probably be oblivious to his degraded condition.
You have conducted an exhaustive search of "all such claims on the internet"?
All that I have seen. Yes.
You have ascertained that "almost" all of them come from "libertarian minded ideologues"?
Yes. Almost always American youths who've been swallowing the steady stream of libertarian propaganda that you get through sites like Slashdot, Digg, Reddit, etc. What is niche in the greater populous is mainstream amongst technologically enabled American youth.
Are you positive that their ideas don't correlate with real world benefits?
Quite positive. The arguments are almost always non-existent when it comes to here and now impacts of the privacy/liberty restrictions (except for arguments based purely on ideology), and the only arguments of strength are based on the premise that the government will turn on the people and use these things against them. Which doesn't bear out as rational when you're talking about countries that are highly ranked for political transparency and stability.
You're obviously exaggerating here, whether you're conscious of it or not.
No, I'm not. I've been observing these arguments for going on ten years now. I'm not an American and don't live in a world where these sorts of beliefs are shared or are common, so they stand out starkly and clearly. They and their character are easy to see. An essay on their constructivist makeup would be an easy write.
I'll wager they're very much not so easy to see or understand from the inside. For an American youth it'll be a case of not seeing the wood for the trees.
You're as much of an ideologue as the "libertarians" you attack. Since your views seem to be those of a modern liberal, it would follow that you would perceive much of the rest of the world to be libertarian by comparison.
Not at all. The rest of the world is largely similar to the balance I perceive as working best at present. The US is also mostly similar to that balance. The libertarian youth of America are the standouts.
You can accuse me of being ideologically driven if you like. I'm not fussed. I'd be a little perplexed if you grew any certainty about which ideology were driving me though. As a pragmatist I draw what I see as useful from a broad range of western political thought.
And to authoritarians, "positive liberty" is an excuse to enforce their will on others because they say they know best.
And sadly, they do know better than libertarians. Were we to have actual libertarian states, we'd be in a sad state of affairs.
Infringing the negative liberties is the first step of a repressive government to suppress dissent, whether the beaten marchers are in Birmingham or in Tehran. If you can't accept that as wrong, I don't think we're going to find much common ground here.
A knife in the hands of a criminal is a weapon, but in the hands of a chef it's a tool to make great food. The intrinsic quality of these things is neutral. The libertarian arguments that they are always bad, will always lead to bad, or open the door to bad are weak when you're talking about trustworthy states.
If you have a corrupt, untrustworthy government, then by all means, try and restrict their power over you. If your government is trustworthy, transparent, and stable, as is your society, then by all means use it as part of the complete functioning system in whatever ways that will improve the lot of the people.
That's a false choice. Living without a gun (or any guns, anywhere) does not equal living without fear, and living with a gun does not mean living with fear.
The gun statement was meant as a caricature. I've no interest in debating the intricacies of gun politics.
By "the ideologically driven" you seem to mean "those who are driven by an ideology different than mine".
Nope. You don't even know what my ideology is. And there are plenty of ideologies that I do not strongly object to (although, of course, I always object to people basing decisions on ideology rather than pragmatic consideration).
I do, however, have a strong objection to the libertarian ideology, as it has the most potential to cause harm, were it ever applied broadly. Even repressive, authoritarian, religious ideologies will ultimately provide better quality of life (until they collapse in flames) than libertarianism if used to govern.